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Business, Daily Bread, Federal Government, Hubris, Local Government, Planning, State Government

Daily Bread for 5.7.22: Fordlandia’s Folly

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Good morning. Saturday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 62.  Sunrise is 5:39 AM and sunset 8:02 PM for 14h 22m 59s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing crescent with 35.4% of its visible disk illuminated. On this day in 1992,  Michigan ratifies a 203-year-old proposed amendment to the United States Constitution making the 27th Amendment law.…

Aside, City, Local Government, Planning, School District

Problems of Small-Town Planning

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Problems of small-town planning are not from lack of plans, they’re from lack of judgment and foresight.  Even the smallest towns have plans, regulations, task forces, etc.  Problems come from planners (both professionals and residents on committees) who lack the judgment to distinguish between big and small matters (and so waste time on the small).…

Coronavirus, Federal Government, Local Government, Planning, Politics, Public Health, State Government

A Necessary Public Policy Question

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Now, and ending one knows not when, public policy proposals that involve human interaction should address, as a necessary element, the question of whether the coronavirus pandemic affects the proposal. A person might assume that he could walk through a forest without ever encountering a wolf, and even convince himself that, by power of suggestion…

Bad Ideas, Boosterism, CDA, Corporate Welfare, Development, Economy, Planning, Poverty, WEDC

Declines, Recessions, and Rhetoric

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While yesterday was a bad day for the financial markets, it’s the underlying – and troubling – fundamental condition of the economy that matters far more. Places like Whitewater, that adopted business special interests’ “if-you-build-it-they-will-come” approach despite increasing poverty and stagnation in household and individual incomes, are especially vulnerable to a downturn. Market Declines. Steven…

Business, CDA, Corporate Welfare, Development, Economics, Economy, Free Markets, Government Spending, Hunger, Innovation Center/Tech Park, Local Government, Planning, Poverty, State Capitalism, That Which Paved the Way, Trump, WEDC, Wisconsin

The Fight Against Gravity

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The Trump Administration wants to bolster industries that are market failures, with coal as an example.  Catherine Rampell writes of that effort in The Trump administration learns that fighting gravity is hard: The Trump administration is learning that, as new data show that the industries it has worked hardest to prop up — through bailouts, tariffs…

CDA, City, Corporate Welfare, Culture, Distraction, Economy, Innovation Center/Tech Park, Local Government, Marketing, Planning, Politics, Poverty, State Capitalism, WEDC

The Two Questions that Haunt Old Whitewater

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Two questions haunt Old Whitewater (where Old Whitewater is a state of mind rather than an age or a particular person): What does it mean to be a college town? and What is meaningful community development? (There are other serious questions, but one can be sure – at the least – that these two have Whitewater…

Babbittry, Bad Ideas, CDA, City, Development, Economy, Government Spending, Local Government, Marketing, Planning, Poverty, That Which Paved the Way, WEDC

A Candid Admission from the Whitewater CDA

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Sometimes, however rarely, even in places with the most stubborn boosterism, an official admits – wittingly or unwittingly – the failure of longstanding policy. Dave Carlson, executive director of the Whitewater Community Development Authority, is such an official. In a press release from March 27th, lauding a provision of the Trump tax bill, Carlson quotes…

CDA, City, Development, Local Government, Marketing, Planning

Hey, CDA: What About the Existing Marketing Plan?

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At tonight’s Community Development Authority meeting, agenda item number 14 surprisingly calls for “Discussion and Possible Action on Community Collaborative Marketing.” Perhaps this means a change to Whitewater’s existing community collaborative marketing plan. Our city leaders have been clear, for many years, about how to market the community. Indeed, other parts of the municipal government…

City, Culture, Demographics, Development, Economy, Free Markets, Good Ideas, Local Government, Planning, Politics, Poverty

Dane, Not the WOW Counties

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For many years, Republicans have railed against Madison, and against Dane County, as bastions of dysfunctional liberalism. Indeed, this impulse has been strong even after the GOP gained control of both chambers of the legislature and the governor’s office. Funny, though, that it’s Dane County – not the WOW counties of Waukesha, Ozaukee, or Washington – that’s…

City, Development, Economy, Laws/Regulations, Local Government, Planning

What a Print Advertiser Means (and Doesn’t Mean)

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So, if one lives in Whitewater, he or she may find a shopper-advertiser in the mailbox, with ads from (mostly) out-of-city advertisers. Even if one omits the publisher’s own ads, and public service announcements, the ratio of out-of-city to Whitewater ads is something like 3 to 1. Indeed, the largest ad, on the front page,…

City, Demographics, Development, Laws/Regulations, Local Government, Planning

The Planning of the Planning Commission’s Subcommittee

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Whitewater’s Planning Commission Subcommittee on Housing recently met on 1.17.18. They had single-family homes and rental properties on their minds.  (The discussion is embedded below, and the city’s file is online.) One could have had this same housing discussion ten or fifteen years ago, and yet, and yet – here we are, ten or fifteen…

Architecture, City, Laws/Regulations, Planning

A Second Empire Bed & Breakfast

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Near the middle of college-town Whitewater, there’s a large Second Empire bed & breakfast that the owners are looking to sell. Whitewater’s Planning Commission, on 1.8.18 in the video clip above, had numerous questions for the prospective buyers. The request afterward met with rejection as a change in zoning & conditional use at  Whitewater’s Planning…